No. 488: "Histortainment"

No. 488: "Histortainment"

"We are in the entertainment business," says Peter Herschend of Silver Dollar City Inc. "We're not in the business of history." His Branson, Mo., company, known for its self-proclaimed Christian values and its creation of Dollywood, will bring its casual attitude to history to the Southern heritage theme park it's building in Stone Mountain, Ga., birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan. Name one of the planned attractions.

It is with genuine sadness that I announce my intention to step down from the News Quiz in order to spend more time with my family (or with Ellen Barkin's family, if I can get the judge to quash that court order). Operations will cease on Election Day.

I've not yet decided on the form of the last quiz. It might be the kind of final episode that ties up all the loose ends and forecloses any chance of reviving the thing—Tim Carvell gets killed in a helicopter crash; the one-armed man turns out to be my father and we finally kiss and then we're both killed in a helicopter crash, that sort of thing. (But did you actually see the body? And do you want to?)

Or it might simply be a typical episode, after which I toast you all with a glass of free-range rug shampoo, throw a crisp salute in the direction of Strom Thurmond's ass, and stroll off into the sunset. ("Then, down the road, if I really need the money, I can come crawling to Michael Kinsley and ask for my cushy job back," I did not add.)

One thing I have decided, there will definitely be a wrap party, and you're all invited. Details to come.

Tory Adored Answer

British Conservative Party leader, William Hague, said it about the New Labor philosophy of Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Speaking in Bournemouth at the party's annual convention, he proclaimed the Tories ready to recapture the nation with a program concentrating on education, health care, old age pensions—or am I thinking of the Republicans? The Democrats?

The party's spokeswoman on law enforcement, News Quiz favorite Ann Widdecombe, made an appeal for "zero tolerance," calling for an automatic $150 fine for anyone caught with even a small amount of marijuana in their bloodstream—no physical possession necessary.

There is something of a rift between her authoritarian wing of the party and the libertarian faction, critical of what they see as her cruel stance on gays, asylum seekers, and minorities, as opposed to their more moderate position of cold-hearted indifference, if I correctly articulate their positions, which I have no interest in doing.

Our Pig-Ignorant Governor Extra

During yesterday's debate between New York's two candidates for the U.S. Senate, Hillary Clinton made a passing reference to E.B. White. In a press conference later, Gov. George Pataki made it aggressively clear that he'd never heard of White:

Rick Lazio looks, sounds and talks like a New Yorker. Mrs. Clinton quoted some guy, Wyatt or somebody—I don't think he was from Brooklyn—with some definition of a New Yorker that she must have read somewhere. I don't know who that guy was. I don't know what he wrote. I don't know where he was from. But it sure doesn't sound to me like that guy was a New Yorker or understood New York the way we do.

As ringing a defense of stupidity as you're likely to hear. Incidentally, as Clyde Haberman points out in his Times column today, White was born in Mount Vernon; where his parents moved from Brooklyn. (It must be acknowledged that Rick Lazio did know that E.B. White wrote Charlotte's Web.)

Common Denominator

W. desperately, and inarticulately, repositions.

Randy Cohen used to write Slate's "News Quiz." His most recent book—oh, like you don't know.

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